SURPRISE, Ariz., – In the Round of Sixteen of the NCAA DII Men's Tennis Championship, the UIndy men's tennis team were narrowly edged 3-4 by Azusa Pacific.
In a match that took over four and a half hours, the Greyhounds faced many ups and downs, but didn't quit until the final point. After dropping a tight doubles point, singles wins from Mathieu Derache, Lorenzo Di Cursi, and Tadeo Gaggiofatto weren't enough to prevail over the Cougars.
INS AND OUTS
The tense nature of doubles set the tone for the rest of the match, where Azusa found momentum to gather the first point of the match.
Asier Ayllon Prado and Mathieu Derache, the No. 47 doubles pair in the nation, opened doubles with a 6-2 win over No. 5 Soeren Grandke and Mathys Pinoit.
The Cougars struck back on court #2, where Viktor van Craenenbroeck and David James Brownlee bested Zaid Shelbaya and Tadeo Gaggiofatto 6-4.
The opening point came down to #3 doubles, where Christopher Marci and Joao Crespo edged Jovan Matovic and Lorenzo Di Cursi 7-5.
The Hounds worked the match to 1-1 after Gaggiofatto breezed past Pinoit 6-1, 6-2 at #2 singles.
Di Cursi deposited another win for UIndy at #6 singles, overpowering Jacob Rudd-Hicks 6-0, 6-3 to give UIndy a 2-1 lead.
Derache tacked on another winning result on court #3, outworking Brownlee 6-2, 6-4 to give UIndy a 3-1 advantage.
The Cougars responded with a win at #1 singles, where Grandke, the No. 26 singles player in DII, downed No. 22 Ayllon Prado 6-2, 6-4.
Azusa leveled the match at 3-3 after Crespo downed Shelbaya in three sets on court #5, winning 6-1, 6-7 (7-9), 6-0.
The match came down to court #4 four, where Matovic was in a fierce battle with Ben Behrend. After Behrend took the first set in a 7-5 tiebreak, Matovic saved a match point to extend the second set to a tiebreak. Matovic needed just one late break to take the second set tiebreak 8-6. In the deciding third set, Behrend found a late service break when the match was at 5-5, and held serve in the ultimate game to clinch the match for the Cougars.
The Greyhounds conclude the 2026 campaign with an 18-5 record, where they won GLVC Regular Season and Tournament Championships, while advancing to the NCAA Round of Sixteen for the ninth straight season.
